Caucasus Studies

The course clarifies the specificity of the South Caucasus Region, as Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia, and the territories around them that are at the crossing-place of different cultures and political systems and that these fault lines have made their region a geopolitical seismic zone. First, course gives information about the geography, population and society, government and administration of the three countries; later it considers their political situation since the end of the Soviet Union in 1991, when the South Caucasus has attracted a lot of Western interest, when the United State in particular has discovered the South Caucasus, and later in August 2008, in the tiny Georgian territory of South Ossetia with barely fifty thousand inhabitant, an exchange of fire between villages escalated into a war between Georgia and Russia. The course considers a series of the U.S. political agendas that have landed in South Caucasus; Georgia and Caucasus-Caspian Oil Geopolitics and NATO Engagement Strategies.

Course leader

Prof. Dr. Tamar Shioshvili, Dean of the Faculty of Education and Humanities at the International Black Sea University in Tbilisi, Georgia.
Dr. Vakhtang Maisaia holds Ph.D. in Politics and Master Degree in Public Administration.
Dr. Tea Chumburidze ho

Target group

International Students

Course aim

Since the region of South Caucasus and its history are so complex that outsiders have always found it difficult to establish and comprehend the essential details, the course with its relevant data obtained from the Caucasus Studies professor-experts teaching at the Caucasus Studies, only English program at the International Black Sea University (Tbilisi, Georgia), as well as American and Azerbaijani professor-experts, its great attention to detail, balanced and straightforward description of events and analysis will provide students with a valuable authentic source of information and understanding about the U.S. engagement in the region with the desire to resolve the three ethno territorial disputes of Abkhazia, Nagorni Karabakh and South Ossetia and calm a potential area of instability.

Credits info

5 EC
5 ECTS (European Credit Transfer System)

Fee info

EUR 300: Euro

Scholarships

NO